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The Trump administration’s claim that the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts is on the verge of financial and structural ruin fell flat before a federal court on Thursday.
U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper said that’s no rationale at all for moving ahead with a $250 million renovation plan that’s contingent upon repeatedly dedicating the revamp to Donald Trump.
“Even if that’s true, if it’s unlawful, you can’t do it,” Cooper said, calling the line of argument a “non-sequitur.”
When DOJ attorney Brantley Mayers, counsel to Assistant Attorney General Brett Schumate, started his arguments by claiming the Kennedy Center was in “structural and financial disarray,” Judge Cooper abruptly cut him off.
Before today’s hearing, the Kennedy Center’s Board set a self-imposed Sept. 8 deadline to move forward with a resolution to launch the renovation, which includes inscribing Trump’s name twice on the building — and renaming the Kennedy Center campus as the “President Donald J. Trump Plaza.”
If the Trump-appointed Board won’t move the deadline, Judge Cooper indicated “there may be a bit of a temporary holding pattern while we give these issues the attention they deserve” — hinting at a likely temporary restraining order.
But a TRO might be the least of Trump’s problems.
‘Financial mismanagement’
Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio), an ex-officio member of the Kennedy Center Board of Trustees, filed the lawsuit that successfully led to the removal of Trump’s name from the building in May. She is standing in the way of Trump’s latest plan to make himself the face of a $250 million renovation of the building. (Congress appropriated the money last year.)
But Beatty’s legal team is also pushing for the judge to order the government to produce evidence concerning the stewardship of JFK’s living memorial under Trumpian management.
“Is this all a smokescreen for financial mismanagement?” Beatty’s attorney Nathaniel Zelinsky pointedly asked in court, referring to the plans for a sudden two-year closure of the Kennedy Center for emergency renovations.
The Kennedy Center’s cultural programming has been paused indefinitely amid a mass withdrawal of artists and disappearing audiences. According to the Washington Post, ticket sales dropped in half the week after Trump’s takeover, and revenue kept cratering from there.
On Monday, the Trump Justice Department’s senior attorneys wrote that the Kennedy Center may have to be “taken down” unless the renovation plan gets the green light.
“This is breathtaking,” Zelinksky said. “It’s a not-so-subtle threat.”
The Trump administration blames decades of financial neglect for what it calls the current “crisis,” but the Kennedy Center’s public tax filings show strong net income for years before Trump’s second term.
Citing the Washington Post’s reporting, Beatty’s legal team wants the judge to order the government to disclose more evidence regarding the reason for the Kennedy Center’s sudden closure.
Offering his theory of the Board’s thinking, Zelinsky said: “We’re shutting this thing down to hide our own embarrassment.”
Judge Cooper appeared receptive to granting some form of discovery on that issue.
‘Tesla Grounds’
Although the Kennedy Center’s cultural programming has been indefinitely suspended, the building remains open for free daily tours on the hour.
A tarp still hangs over the front portico where the Kennedy Center’s Board of Trustees complied at the eleventh hour to take down Trump’s name, apparently damaging the irreplaceable Italian marble from the region where Michelangelo found the raw material for “David.”
Joining one of the tours would immediately debunk the Trump administration’s claims that the grounds are “structurally unsafe” and “embarrassing to the National Capital.” Without any visible sign of hazards, staffers lead visitors through all three theaters in the main building: the Concert Hall, Opera House and Eisenhower Hall. The Grand Foyer that connects them all stretches to 618 feet, longer than the Washington Monument laid at a horizontal. The same Tuscan marble is on the walls of the Hall of States and the Hall of Nations, where U.S. and world flags greet visitors.
In the Justice Department’s telling, only Trump can save it, and the plan to rehabilitate it hinges upon crediting him twice on the renovation with the inscriptions “Renovated and Restored by President Donald J. Trump” and “Endowed by the Trump Kennedy Center Fund.”
Judge Cooper’s previous order made clear that Congress forbade renaming the Kennedy Center or creating a memorial for anyone else in it. The Trump Justice Department claims the dedication isn’t a memorial but a dedication for an endowment.
Scoffing at the distinction, Beatty’s attorney said it would leave a “gaping hole” allowing anyone to rededicate or sell off other parts of JFK’s memorial.
“Call it ‘Tesla Grounds,’” Zelinsky said, noting that the so-called “plaza” remains undefined. “Sell it to the highest bidder.”
Zelinsky said that even naming the fundraising entity the Trump Kennedy Center Fund violates the judge’s order — by implying the existence of a Trump Kennedy Center.
Worse, Zelinsky said, the government has said that the board revised its bylaws to claw back donations if Trump’s name were removed from the building.
“How is that not contumacious, your honor?” Zelinsky said.
“I’ll ask your colleague about that,” Cooper countered.
Despite that line, Cooper hasn’t yet raised the prospect of a finding of contempt.
Can you please say more about this sentence from your article: “Congress appropriated the money last year.” Who asked for this appropriation and why? To do what?
Interesting that the Italian marble facade whereon the letter’s of Trump’s name were affixed was damaged during the removal of them. Would appreciate seeing and reading more reporting out of the DC press about that fact—as in irreparable damage to irreplaceable marble imported from Italy over 63 years ago.